


Why Buy the Cow?

by paramountie



Category: Common Law (TV)
Genre: Commitment, Established Relationship, M/M, Marriage Proposal, Post-Canon, Therapy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-08
Updated: 2018-05-08
Packaged: 2019-05-04 03:52:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,188
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14584359
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/paramountie/pseuds/paramountie
Summary: They’d been together for a long time, but they’d never talked about marriage. It was off the table, permanently. Hell, moving in together had barely worked out. They’d nearly broken up over what color to paint their new kitchen.Well, Wes had seriously thought about dumping Travis, at least.-Or: Travis wants to get married. Wes doesn't.





	Why Buy the Cow?

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to my lovely beta, pavonem!

It wouldn’t be a surprise if Travis had come out of the womb with a pathological fear of golden rings and white picket fences. While other children had nightmares about Freddy Krueger hacking them up, he’d probably dreamt about Freddy Krueger popping the question. Or Jason Voorhees picking out wedding invitations.

Off the top of his head, Wes could remember five separate occasions where Travis had called him in a panic, begging him to come up with an emergency so that he could get out of a date. When Wes asked why he wanted to abandon whoever had been stupid enough to go out with him, Travis had given the following reasons:

  * His date had said they were “looking for a soulmate.
  * His date had said they “loved kids.”
  * His date had mentioned the engagement of a friend, family member, or celebrity.
  * His date had mentioned the divorce of a celebrity. (“Ever since Brad and Jen split, Wes, everyone’s been getting married. It’s like they think weddings are going extinct.”)
  * Someone in the vicinity had proposed to someone else in the vicinity, and Travis had been unable to prevent his date from seeing it happen.



On a few of these occasions, Wes had found some pity in the depths of his heart, and bailed Travis out. (“Tell him I got shot, Trav. Oh, you don’t sound very upset about that.”) The rest of the time, he’d told him to shove his commitment issues where the sun don’t shine, and hung up the phone.

Because Travis did have commitment issues. His commitment issues were so extensive that most people could sense them the moment they got within a twenty foot radius. The day that Wes’s mom met Travis, she’d wrinkled up her nose and said: “That child never had a mother. It’s why he wears so much leather.” This could be loosely translated into: “Dear God, that poor man didn’t have a family to love him and now he’s taking it out on all of us!”

That was just how he was. He wore too much leather, he rode a motorcycle, and he had commitment issues. Wes had given up on trying to change him a long time ago. He was used to him, and, God help him, he _loved_ him. Despite Wes’s better judgment and Travis’s many character flaws.

But recently, Travis had started to change. He was still weird about marriage, but he was weird in a new way. A new, disturbing way.

Exhibit A: He’d started reading wedding magazines. Well, _technically_ , he’d read a wedding magazine, once, while they were in the waiting room of a dentist’s office. The aforementioned dentist was a suspect in their current case, and they were going to bring him in for questioning the moment he finished his root canal.

The two of them had crammed themselves into some crappy plastic chairs under the “Flossing is fun!” sign. While Travis picked through the magazines stack, Wes watched the TV playing in the corner. It was Fox News, of course. He already knew this guy was the murderer.

“Can you believe this shit,” Travis said, shuffling through the pages of one of the magazines. Proably _People_. Travis could never resist a gossip rag.

Wes tuned him out. Apparently, a girl from LA had just won the national spelling bee.

“What is this?” said Travis. The girl on the TV was shaking hands and posing. Her teeth were too white.

“That’s hideous,” said Travis. Now, the girl was gone, and a somber newscaster was talking about a murder in Beverly Hills.

“Yikes,” said Travis. They kept showing the same picture of a decapitated head over and over. So sensationalized. People got decapitated all the time.

“Look at this,” said Travis, and suddenly there was a magazine shoved in Wes’s face. On the page, instead of the normal array of scantily dressed movie stars, there were a bunch of stick-thin models. In wedding dresses.

“What?” Wes asked, and Travis poked at one of the dresses.

“It’s so ugly,” he said, “Who wants a yellow wedding dress? And that bow at the back. Jesus.”

“Okay,” Wes said.

“You don’t have an opinion? Come on, you’re the most judgmental person on earth.”

“I don’t care.” Although now that he looked properly, that dress did have far too much tulle. “Why do you care?”

“You’re telling me you’re going to let them get away with this?” Travis asked. “You gave me a twenty minute lecture on why I shouldn’t wear brown shoes and black pants, but _Premier Bride_ gets a free pass?”

“I’m not dating _Premier Bride_ ,” Wes said, “And why are you reading that anyway?”

“I couldn’t find anything else.”

“ _Us Weekly_ is right next to your elbow.”

“I already read that one.”

“There’s a _Cosmo_ over…”

“What are you, the magazine police?”

“No, I’m the regular police.”

In response, Travis huffed and tugged the magazine back onto his lap. For the next couple of minutes, he could be heard muttering words like “bow” and “useless” and “I’m the regular police too, _Wes_.”

It was all very strange.

Exhibit B: He’d started crying at weddings. And it wasn’t panicked crying, or _that poor person just lost their freedom forever_ crying. It was happy crying. In the past, only videos of cats playing with yarn and the ending of _The Fast and the Furious_ could make Travis happy cry.

Although maybe the crying wasn’t a pattern. The only wedding they’d attended recently had been Kate and Amy’s, a few months back. Travis had burst into tears the moment he saw Kate floating down the aisle in a tasteful gray suit.

The crying only got worse (and louder. So much louder.) when the minister asked Kate and Amy to kiss the bride.

“Travis,” Wes said, in his most comforting voice. It wasn’t particularly comforting, he knew that, and it was laced with stress. Amy’s great-aunt was giving them a dirty look from a few rows over. “You okay?”

The only response to this was more blubbering. Wes nodded, and rubbed some soothing circles into Travis’s back.

By the time the ceremony was over, Travis’s eyes were puffy and red. A few stray tears lingered in the corners.

“I didn’t know you cared that much,” Wes said, “You told me that they’d be divorced in a year.”

“I never said that. You said that.”

“Oh.”

“I bet on five years.” He wiped at his cheeks. “But now I change my mind.”

“Why? Did one of them tell you something? You can’t make bets when you’ve got insider information, Travis.”

“They won’t get divorced,” he said, and it was all Wes could do to keep from gaping. “They love each other.”

“When has that ever stopped a divorce?” Wes asked.

Travis narrowed his swollen eyes.

“What made you like this?” he asked, crossing his arms. “I’ve got a couple of theories, but I can never pick. Did your parents not hug you enough?”

“They hugged me plenty,” Wes said, “And you’re just as bad. You once told me that all marriages end in divorce or murder.”

“That was the old Travis. Pre-therapy Travis.”

“Christ.”

Travis stepped forward, into Wes’s space, hands coming up to rest against the lapels of Wes’s suit. He looked up at Wes through his eyelashes. The bastard.

Winning arguments had gotten a lot more difficult when they started sleeping together.

“Would you murder me?” Travis asked.

“Yes.”

“Mean.”

Now, Travis was running a finger along Wes’s tie.

“Stop hitting on me in front of Amy’s grandma,” Wes said. Travis busted out a sick, sadistic smile, and pressed a kiss to the corner of Wes’s mouth.

“She doesn’t mind.”

“I mind that she doesn’t mind.”

Amy’s grandmother was giving them the eye now. She’d teamed up with the great aunt and starting whispering. Probably something lascivious, if the way she was checking out Travis’s ass was any indication.

“I wouldn’t murder you,” Travis said, snaking his arms around Wes’s waist. Pointedly, Wes didn’t wrap his arms around Travis. He just let them hang there, like limp noodles.

“Yes, you would.” If Wes could keep his eyes fixed on the floral arrangements over Travis’s shoulder, he wouldn’t be manipulated by the cruel things Travis was doing with his eyelashes. And his eyebrows. And his mouth. “And it doesn’t matter because we’re not married.”

Travis’s hold suddenly loosened.

“Yeah,” he said, letting go of Wes entirely, and taking a step back. “We’re not.”

Exhibit C: And then, there were the strange things that Wes had found on Travis’s phone.

Throughout the entirety of their relationship (professional and romantic), the two of them had made a habit of guessing each other’s passwords. It was a game that had begun out of necessity (Travis was always forgetting to forward important work emails to Wes, and Wes was sick of it.) and quickly become a way to prove, once and for all, which of them was the better detective.

Back in the day, they’d attempted to elude each other by coming up with strong passwords. Complex strings of letters, numbers, and symbols, randomly chosen and impossible to guess.

Now, their passwords were insults. The most successful password Wes ever picked had been “travissux,” because Travis had assumed that Wes would never use improper capitalization or incorrect spelling.

However, one day, not too long ago, Wes discovered that the password on Travis’s phone was not “dick” or “asshole” or “bad@sex.” After a series of unsuccessful hacking attempts, it became clear that Travis had used an _actual_ password. A password that was meant to keep Wes out.

Why did he want to keep Wes out?

After significant internal debate, Wes decided that Travis was not having an affair. He was not having an affair for a number of reasons:

  * It would be idiotic to cheat on a cop, even if you, yourself, were a cop.
  * In all of Travis’s previous relationships, he’d left the moment he got bored. Yes, this particular relationship had been going on for four years now, but that didn’t mean that the leopard had changed his spots.
  * Did he mention that it was really, truly, phenomenally stupid to cheat on a cop? And Travis was not stupid, despite Wes’s frequent claims to the contrary.
  * Wes was great in bed.
  * Travis loved Wes, or whatever.



After coming to these conclusions, Wes found himself in a state of inner turmoil. Should he keep trying to guess the password? Would breaking into Travis’s phone now make him seem like an obsessive, insecure lunatic, or would it be a continuation of the game? If he didn’t break into Travis’s phone, would _that_ make him an obsessive, insecure lunatic? Or would it mean that he respected Travis’s privacy? Even though he’d never respected Travis’s privacy before?

Damn it, Wes had never worried about this kind of thing with Alex.

In the end, he decided to continue as normal. He would figure out the password, unlock Travis’s phone, and he wouldn’t find anything incriminating inside. He wouldn’t, okay?

When he finally managed it, he was in bed, Travis next to him, half-asleep. As Travis’s breaths evened into a steady, rumbling snore, Wes slipped his phone off its charger.

What he found inside that phone was so much worse than an affair.

It was a Pinterest board. For _wedding ideas_.

Page after page of table settings, tasteful floral arrangements, expansive reception halls, invitation layouts, and, dear God, boutonnières.

Wes’s mind went wild with questions. How did Travis know what a boutonnière was? Who had told Travis about Pinterest? Could Wes arrest them? Did Travis really expect him to get married on a beach? Because there were a lot of beach pictures on his board, and Wes would die before he tied the knot outdoors. It was tacky, and he’d get sand in his expensive shoes.

And then there was the biggest, most important question: Did Travis want to get married?

Obviously he wanted to get married. Why else would he have that Pinterest board? Why else would he get misty-eyed at other people’s weddings? Why else would he read _Premier Bride_?

Travis wanted to get married. He wanted to get married to _Wes_.

Wes dropped the phone and gaped at Travis.

Everything about him was familiar. The rumpled white of his t-shirt, the line where his hair curled into his neck. Off the top of his head, Wes could list Travis’s favorite color, favorite animal, and favorite early 2000s teen movie. When he was sick, Wes could rattle off his entire medical history to the doctor.

The last time one of Travis’s girlfriends had suggested marriage, he’d shown up at Wes’s hotel room in the middle of the night. All he’d had with him was a pair of jeans, two t-shirts, and a toothbrush stuffed into a backpack.

“She’s smothering me, man,” Travis said, and Wes had been too stupid (or lovestruck, maybe) to slam the door in his face.

They’d been together for a long time, but they’d never talked about marriage. It was off the table, permanently. Hell, moving in together had barely worked out. They’d nearly broken up over what color to paint their new kitchen.

Well, Wes had seriously thought about dumping Travis, at least.

They shouldn’t have been together this long when Travis’s relationships usually lasted for a month and a half, on average. His shortest relationship been with Mindy Brown, from high school. They’d gotten together and broken up over the span of a single pool party. His longest relationship, pre-Wes, had been with Gina Chang. They’d met while Travis was on vacation, and he’d forgotten they were dating until three months later.

That was the thing, with Travis. He couldn’t commit, because he couldn’t plan ahead. He never imagined a life outside of that party, that vacation. His relationships lived and died with his attention span. By some fluke, he’d managed to stick with Wes for awhile, but there was no way it could last, and nothing would send Travis running faster than a wedding ring.

Travis didn’t know himself, and that was the real problem. He’d thought he was in love with Mindy Brown and Gina Chang. He’d thought that fire engine red was a good color for a breakfast nook. And he thought that he wanted to marry Wes, when it was blazingly, blindingly obvious that it could never work out.

Wes wasn’t going to fall into that trap again, and he wouldn’t let Travis fall either.

* * *

After that, Wes was on the alert for change in Travis’s behavior. It seemed that, aside from his new, pro-wedding agenda, he was the same old, annoying Travis. He still changed all the presets in Wes’s car without asking. He still stole socks from Wes’s drawer. He still praised Wes’s cooking the way a starving man would praise a piece of bread.

“Babe, this chicken parm makes the angels sing,” he said, one evening. “It’s heaven on a plate. I think I’m going to cry.”

“You only say that because you don’t want to cook,” Wes said, dropping his plate on the table and settling into his seat. “I can teach you. Anytime.”

“Uh, pass.”

“See,” Wes said. He pointed his fork at Travis. “You’re lazy. That’s why you’re so obsessed with my cooking. You’re afraid of the kitchen.”

“Man, why can’t you take a compliment?”

“I can take a compliment.”

“You’re running in circles trying to avoid this one, and you know you’re a good cook. Accept it, Wes. Say ‘thank you.’”

Wes pursed his lips and took a bite of his chicken. It was chewy, and a bit tough. Not that Travis would ever admit it.

“You’re afraid of cooking,” Wes said, “Ever since you burned your hand on that barbecue.”

“I’m not afraid of cooking,” Travis said, mouth stuffed with pasta. “That was a funny anecdote, not a childhood trauma. I’ll learn to cook. But I don’t want _you_ to teach me.”

“I’m a great teacher.”

“You’re not. You’re mean, like a nun at a Catholic school.”

“I have high standards.”

“You’d probably hit me with a spoon.”

“I wouldn’t.”

“You would.”

Wes opened his mouth to respond, but he realized how quickly this would turn into schoolyard taunts, and then food fighting, and he didn’t want to scrape linguini off the ceiling again.

“How did you feed yourself before me?” he asked instead, and Travis rested his chin in his hand, giving Wes a marinara-ridden grin.

“You’ll never have to find out,” he said, “You’re stuck with me.”

Something in Wes’s stomach dropped, but he tried to keep it from showing on his face.

“Hm,” he said instead, picking up a knife. It was, for all intents and purposes, a neutral “hm,” an insignificant “hm,” a completely and utterly meaningless “hm.” In reality, there were many emotional layers behind that “hm,” but Travis never needed to know that.

He figured it out immediately, of course.

“What does that mean?” he asked, pointing a fork at Wes. “Why’d you hum like that?”

“Hum like what?” Wes asked. Once, in therapy, Dr. Ryan had given him a thirty minute lecture on evasion, and the importance of proper emotional communication. She’d insisted that if Wes never learned to communicate openly and honestly, all of his relationships would be doomed to failure. Wes had thought that she shouldn’t be allowed to doom her clients, but being stuck with him for several years had made all of her advice take a distinctly apocalyptic turn.

“Hum, all sadly. A hum that says ‘No, Travis, I won’t be stuck with you, because I have a flesh-eating bacteria in my brain. That kind of hum.”

“You’re reading a lot into one syllable.”

“Doesn’t mean I’m wrong.”

Wes had to concede the point.

“I just find it strange how you say things like that.”

“What, flesh-eating bacteria?”

“No,” Wes said. “You say that I’m stuck with you. But if I said the same thing, you’d panic.”

“I wouldn’t panic.”

“Travis, you always panic. When a girl mentions marriage, you panic. When a guy wants to move in, you panic. At any sign of long-term commitment, you panic.”

The joy drained from Travis’s expression.

“Wes, we’ve been together four years,” he said, irritated, “I think that counts as a long-term commitment.”

And here it was. Argument #1. Dr. Ryan had told them once to name the fights that came up over and over. According to her, some arguments never died, and the best couples were the ones who could put a name to them, avoid them when they cropped up again. For the most part, it worked. (“Wes, it is too early for you to be number five-ing me right now.”) They stopped picking at each other over dinner choices and the sharpshooter competition. But not Argument #1. They could never let #1 go.

“Of course it does,” Wes said. “That’s not what I’m saying.”

“So what are you saying?” Travis asked, dropping his fork and letting it clatter against the plate.

“We’re together. But you still freak out every time—”

“I don’t freak out.”

“Every time I mention any sort of—”

“I don’t _freak out_.”

“Commitment. Like when we moved in together! I couldn’t say anything, I had to let you bring your stuff over gradually—”

“I wouldn’t have freaked out if we’d actually talked about—”

“I feel like I have to treat this whole relationship with kid gloves.”

“You don’t!” Travis said. He threw up his hands, expression caught somewhere between angry and manic. The words dried up in Wes’s throat. “Jesus, Wes, you don’t have to keep tiptoeing around me, like this is a goddamn hostage situation. We can talk about things.”

Wes didn’t respond, just glared down at his plate. Why didn’t Travis know himself by now? Why couldn’t he recognize the pattern? When would Wes stop having to do the thinking for both of them?

“Argument #1,” Wes said, which was as good as admitting defeat. “We’re not going to get anywhere with this.”

“We could,” Travis snapped.

“We won’t,” Wes replied, and they didn’t talk much for the rest of the meal.

* * *

Perhaps, Wes hadn’t needed to watch so carefully for a change in Travis’s behavior. After all, Travis was usually about as subtle as a grenade.

“I want to marry you,” Travis said, a night after the argument, and there it was. All of Wes’s questions were answered, all of his curiosity was blown to pieces.

“Oh,” Wes said. Then, he stood there, stupidly, with a toothbrush shoved between his teeth, and minty foam dribbling out of his mouth.

“Is that committed enough for you?”

Now, Travis was grinning at him all smugly, like he’d actually resolved something. Ended Argument #1 once and for all. As if a _marriage proposal_ was a magic fix for the fear of abandonment that had followed Travis since childhood.

“I do not want to be having this conversation right now,” Wes said, although his words were muffled by the toothpaste. Quickly, he stepped back to the bathroom and spat into the sink.

“When would be a good time for this conversation?”

“I don’t know, daytime?”

“I tried talking about it during the day.”

“Arguing about it doesn’t count. And you never actually said the word ‘marriage.’”

“I hinted.”

Wes glared at his pale, blue-tinted face in the mirror, and tried to school his expression into something a little less hostile. The tightness around his eyes would have to go, and he’d probably have to unclench his jaw.

“Is this supposed to be a proposal?” Wes asked. He rubbed at his frown lines, hoping that they’d ease into laughter lines. Nice, approachable, open-minded laughter lines. Dr. Ryan couldn’t yell at him for having laughter lines. “Because it’s awful.”

“It’s not that bad,” Travis said, and he even sounded affronted.

“Do you have a ring?”

Long pause.

“I could get a ring.”

“Christ.”

Wes stomped back into the bedroom, and pointed his toothbrush at Travis.

“I am not marrying you so that you can win an argument.”

“This isn’t me trying to win an argument!”

“Like hell it isn’t.” Wes threw his toothbrush in the direction of its holder and headed towards his side of the bed. They had a rule that they weren’t allowed to fight in bed. The moment that one of them was under the covers, bickering had to cease. It was the only thing that kept them on a regular sleep schedule.

“Wes,” Travis said, and Wes ignored him, flicking off the light on his bedside table. “ _Wes_. I want to marry you.”

“You don’t,” Wes said.

“You can’t tell me I don’t want what I want.”

“I can tell you when you think you want something, but you don’t really want it.”

“That’s the same thing!”

Wes grabbed at his sheet, but before he could pull it up, Travis’s hand clamped down on his wrist, pressing it into the mattress. His face was close to Wes’s now, and the half-light was making his stupid eyes sparkle.

“I love you,” Travis said, “I want to marry you.”

For a long moment, Wes didn’t reply. It would be easy to say yes. To give in. They’d waste thousands of dollars on an expensive ceremony, all because Travis said he wanted it, and then Travis would panic. Leave Wes at the altar, or worse, leave him months, maybe years later. Wes would be stuck: finding a divorce lawyer, finding a new place to live, splitting their home right down the middle. It was exhausting, and it hurt like hell, and he didn’t want to do it again.

“You don’t,” he said, and twisted his arm free. He put his head down on his pillow, and squeezed his eyes shut.

For a long time, Travis was silent.

“Don’t want to get married, or don’t love you?” he asked, and Wes groaned into his pillow.

“Go to sleep,” he said, but he heard a shuffle of sheets, and felt the solid press of Travis behind him.

“I love you,” Travis said, “I’m crazy about you. Literally, most of the time.”

“Go to sleep,” Wes repeated, but he could feel the conviction draining out of him.

“You’re my family, okay? I want you to be my family. That’s why I’m asking. You could be my husband, and then we could have a dog, and some kids. God, imagine the two of us with kids. Imagine the two of us with _grandkids_. You were meant to be a grandpa, Wes, we both know it.”

He fell quiet again, and his hand landed on Wes’s side, curled around his hip.

“That’s what I want, Wes. It really is. Is it what you want?”

How was Wes supposed to answer that?

After a few minutes, Travis pulled away.

* * *

The next day, it seemed like Travis couldn’t decide whether he wanted to prove that he was perfect husband material or punish Wes for denying his innate husband potential. He alternated between angrily doing the dishes. (He almost chipped several mugs in the process, and there was more fork scraping than seemed entirely necessary. Or possible.) And grouchily paying the bills. (He pressed down with his pen so hard that he tore through the paper. Several times. Would the electric company even accept ripped bills?)

All in all, it was a productive day for the both of them.

Then, it was time for therapy.

Wes had wanted to stop going to therapy when they’d gotten together, because they were fine now. They _liked_ each other now. Most of their old problems had been sexual tension in disguise. Well, the major problems, at least.

But aside from complaining about it a few times, he hadn’t really tried to stop going. It helped them. Talking things out wasn’t exactly one of Wes’s strengths, and his preferred mode of conflict resolution had always been good-cop-bad-cop. But you couldn’t good-cop-bad-cop your boyfriend.

Or, at least, that’s what Dr. Ryan said. It wasn’t like anyone had ever _tried_.

Wes liked having therapy to rely on. During their worst fights, the ones where everything Wes wanted to say got tangled up in his head, he didn’t worry so much. That this would be the end of them. That Travis would storm off into the night, never to be seen again. If Wes couldn’t solve things, Dr. Ryan could. If she couldn’t fix things, then maybe they weren’t supposed to be fixed.

Of course, he never said any of this out loud. And going to therapy was a hell of a lot harder when he wasn’t the one doing the complaining.

“How are all of you today?” Dr. Ryan said, voice prim. Travis was keeping a careful distance from Wes, arms crossed tightly over his chest and a huge, fake smile on his face. He always smiled like that when he was about to drag Wes’s good name through the mud.

“Great,” Wes said, to get ahead of things, “And you?”

“Fine,” Dr. Ryan said. “How about you, Travis?”

“Wes doesn’t want to marry me,” he said, the words bursting out of him like air from a balloon. Dr. Ryan’s mouth dropped open and Wes pinched the bridge of his nose.

“Seriously? The whole group isn’t even here yet.”

“They’ll be here soon,” Travis said, smug, and sure enough there was the sound of Peter’s voice coming down the hallway.

“Perhaps you should wait,” Dr. Ryan said, as the door opened. Of course, he ignored her, and twisted around in his seat.

“Wes doesn’t want to marry me,” he said, and Dakota gasped.

“But you two were doing so well!”

“That’s what I thought,” he said, “I guess I’m not good enough to become a Mitchell.”

“I never said that,” Wes snapped, “And there’s no way in hell you’d change your name.”

“I might!”

“You wouldn’t.”

“Marks is a better last name, _okay_? It’s cooler.”

“It is not—”

“Boys,” Dr. Ryan said, holding up a placating hand, “Can we at least wait until everyone is seated?”

That bought a few moments of quiet while Peter and Dakota settled into their chairs. Rozelle started shuffling around in her purse, and Wes hoped, fruitlessly, that’d she’d never find what she was looking for. Surely, it could take a full hour to locate the right tube of lipstick amongst the overwhelming array of crumpled tissues, leaking pens, and old receipts.

Tragically, Rozelle gave up her search, and dropped her purse next to her feet. Then, all eyes were on Wes. There was judgment in those eyes. Judgement and cruel, cruel pity.

“Now,” Dr. Ryan said, “Tell us how this began.”

Both Wes and Travis opened their mouths, but she held up a quieting finger.

“One at a time. Travis, begin. Wes, we’re going to play ‘Let Him Finish.’”

Let Him Finish was a game she’d invented a few years back, when she’d gotten sick of Wes and Travis talking over each other. Now, if either of them interrupted the other’s story, they’d owe that person one Lifelong Favor. Wes already owed Travis four Lifelong Favors, and this was after he’d used three of them to make Wes play laser tag.

Shockingly, none of the other couples ever had to play Let Him Finish. It was a WesTravis special.

“It started last night,” Travis began, and then he told the whole story, embellishing all the way. In his version, Wes was some kind of evil, marriage-hoarding dragon, and Travis was the handsome knight sent to defeat him.

The whole room was enthralled. At one point, Mr. Dumont even gasped. By the time Travis finished, Mrs. Dumont was glaring at West, and Dakota’s eyes were suspiciously tearful.

“So, Wes,” Dr. Ryan said, “Thoughts?”

Oh, he had _thoughts_. He had a hell of a lot of thoughts. Everything from basic grammar corrections (when would Travis learn how to use “whom” properly?) to a fifteen minute lecture on the merits of unbiased reporting. But when Wes opened his mouth, all that came out was:

“Why does this matter so much to you?”

For a moment, the room was silent. Wes couldn’t figure out where that question had come from when he knew the answer already. Travis was emotional, excitable, _stubborn_. Some random impulse had told him he wanted to marry Wes, and now he’d do it or die trying. It was like when he went busting into a bank robbery without backup, or ate sugary cereal even though it made him sick all day.

“What?” Travis asked.

Wes huffed, but before he could say anything, Dr. Ryan intervened.

“Why doesn’t it matter to you?” she asked, and Wes fought the urge to roll his eyes.

“It’s a slip of paper,” he said, exasperated, “Sure, marriage has some legal benefits. But it doesn’t _mean_ anything.”

“You’ve been married before,” Dr. Ryan said. Her gaze was focused on him, steady. “It must have meant something to you back then.”

“Yeah,” Wes said, and hesitated, “No. Why are we talking about me, anyway?”

“You’re the one who doesn’t want to get married,” Dr. Ryan said, “Unless Travis is misrepresenting your opinion?”

“It’s not about me,” Wes said. “It’s about him. He’s scared of commitment.”

Travis threw his hands into the air.

“Every time,” he muttered, and the rest of the room seemed to agree. Peter was shaking his head. Mr. and Mrs. Dumont were exchanging pinched looks. Clyde had settled back in his chair, bored, and Rozelle was rummaging through her purse again.

“What?” Wes asked. “How am I supposed to know if he’s changed?”

“It’s been four years!” Travis said.

“Four years is nothing. A marriage is your whole life.”

“I know that!”

“Boys,” Dr. Ryan said, and they quieted, Travis crossing his arms across his chest, “I think I have an idea of what your problem is.”

“Him,” Travis said, sticking a thumb in Wes’s direction, at the same time as Wes said: “Travis, obviously.”

“I believe you are still suffering the repercussions of Wes and Alex’s divorce,” she said.

Wes’s mouth fell open.

“Ooo,” Dakota said.

“What?” Wes asked. He looked around the room, desperately, for an ally against Dr. Ryan’s psychoanalytical nonsense, but everyone was tilting their heads and tapping their chins, like they thought she was making a point. Didn’t the other couples realize what a slippery slope this was? Next, Dr. Ryan was going to start blathering in about the subconscious. After that, she’d start blaming everything on their mothers.

He could deal with a lot of things in therapy, but Oedipal complexes were where he drew the line.

“That’s not what this is about,” he said, “This has nothing to do with Alex.”

“This is all about Alex,” Travis said, and smacked Wes’s arm. “The doc did it, man. She _therapized_ you.”

“A second marriage can be difficult after the failure of the first,” Dr. Ryan said.

“That’s not the problem,” Wes said.

“You’ve lost your faith in relationships.”

“ _Travis_ never had any faith in relationships! This is about him!”

“I gained faith, man,” Travis said, settling back into his seat. “You showed me the light.”

“I have an idea for an exercise,” Dr. Ryan said. Suddenly, there was a manic gleam in her eyes.

“I don’t need an exercise.”

“I love exercises,” Travis said, even though when she’d made them play the Silent Game last week, he’d complained the whole car ride home.

“For the next session, I want you to work on viewing relationships differently,” she said. “Every time you encounter a couple, I want you to think of three positive things about their relationship.”

“Wes loves lists,” Travis said.

“Three whole things?” Wes said.

“Three whole things,” Dr. Ryan said, nodding sagely. “This will help you look at relationships in a more positive light.”

“Three things?” Wes asked again.

“Three things,” she repeated.

* * *

“I love this game,” Travis said, as they left the building. “Where do you want to start?”

The sun was shining in Wes’s eyes. He slipped on his sunglasses and glared at the persistent blue sky.

“Nowhere,” he said, and Travis nudged him with his elbow.

“Come on, babe,” he said, “This has everything you love. Lists and judging other people.”

“But I’m not allowed to judge other people,” Wes said, slipping his car keys out of his pocket. “I’m supposed to be _positive_.”

“I think you can do both.”

They got into the car, but Travis didn’t buckle up. He just grinned at Wes, wide and stupid.

“Let’s start with the Dumonts.”

“They should get a divorce,” Wes said, because they should. The two of them didn’t have any chemistry, and Mrs. Dumont was clearly still in love with her high school sweetheart. She wouldn’t stop talking about the restaurant the guy had opened in Boston.

Travis had even looked the ex up on Facebook. He was fairly attractive. Not exactly Wes’s type, but Travis had said he was “a solid 8, dude.”

“Nope,” Travis said. “You have to be nice.”

“It would be nice if they got a divorce.”

“Oh, come on. You can do better than that.”

Wes started the car, refusing to reply.

“Can’t you think of anything?”

“No.”

“Okay,” Travis said, holding up his hands in surrender. “I guess this game is too hard for you.”

“That’s not going to work,” Wes said, scowling at the road.

“It’s a tough game, I admit it.” He leaned back in his seat, gazing thoughtfully out the window. “Although, I’ve already come up with a few things.”

“Like hell.”

“I have,” he insisted. Then, he turned to Wes, a crafty smile worming its way onto his face. “I bet I can come up with more nice things than you.”

_Damn it_ , Wes thought, fingers tightening on the steering wheel. This was another reason why they shouldn’t get married. Travis already knew him too well. If he knew him any better, he’d be able to trick him in anything. Like jumping off a bridge, or calling his mother.

“You’re just as mean as I am,” Wes said, last ditch.

“Nah, I’m sweet,” Travis replied. “I believe in love.”

* * *

In the end, they got smoothies and went to the beach, because it was the perfect place for spotting (terrible, awful, horrifying) couples. Everywhere Wes looked, people were holding hands, kissing sloppily, rubbing their sweaty bodies all over each other. At that very moment, there was a woman in a pink bikini lounging under an umbrella and gnawing on her tan boyfriend’s neck. Another couple was sitting crammed together in a tiny, rickety beach chair, talking with their mouths only inches from each other.

How was he supposed to think positively about all this?

“Peter and Dakota,” Travis said, and took a long, loud slurp of his mango smoothie.

Wes squinted at the surf, wracking his brain. He tried not to look at the cannibalistic woman in the bikini, who’d moved to munching on her boyfriend’s ears. A few feet away from her, a chubby toddler was screaming at her father, half-crushed ice cream cone in her hand.

“Their baby is very quiet,” Wes said, finally.

“She’s cute, too,” Travis said. “That’s my first positive thing. Next?”

Wes cleared his throat and stared up at the sky. Most of the time, he zoned out when Peter or Dakota was talking in therapy. It seemed like they had the same problems over and over. Peter worried that he didn’t buy Dakota good gifts. Dakota worried that she didn’t say “I love you” enough. It was nauseating.

“They are very affectionate,” Wes said, the words dragging out of him, like a splinter from a finger.

“Yeah, they’re gross,” Travis said, wrinkling his nose.

“That’s negative,” Wes said, “Lose a point.”

“Shit,” Travis said. Earlier, he’d grabbed a notepad from Wes’s car and now it was balanced on his knee, open page filled with tally marks. Or at least, Travis’s side of the page was filled with tallies. Wes’s was mostly blank.

“Okay, my next one,” Travis said. He tapped his chin with the pencil. “Peter laughs at all of Dakota’s jokes. Even the puns.”

“He shouldn’t encourage her.”

“Are you judging their relationship right now?”

“No, I’m judging his sense of humor.”

Travis narrowed his eyes, but didn’t erase any of Wes’s points.

“Your turn,” he said, shifting so that his head was in Wes’s lap, the arm of his sunglasses pressing into Wes’s stomach.

“I don’t know,” he said, letting his hand rest on Travis’s chest, next to his collarbone. This wasn’t PDA, this was efficient use of space. “I can’t think of anything.”

“Are you giving up?”

“I have a headache.”

“Are you giving up?”

“I think I’m getting heat stroke.”

Travis nabbed Wes’s hand, pressed a light kiss against his wrist. He looked up at Wes through his eyelashes.

“Babe,” he said, a smile slinking around his mouth, “are you giving up?”

“Never,” Wes said, detaching his hand from Travis’s vice-like grip. “Dakota and Peter never torture each other with inane competitions.”

Travis squinted up at him, pursing his lips.

“I’ll allow it,” he said, finally, “But only because of your heat stroke.”

* * *

Over the next week, they listed the positive traits of every couple they knew, and many they didn’t. Clyde and Rozelle. (He supported her career.) Captain Sutton and Helen. (Therapy had probably lowered his blood pressure so much, he’d live another 50 years.)The bank robbers they brought in on Thursday. (The family that steals together…) The yoga-obsessed lesbians at their gym. (They were lesbians, which made them better than other people.)

They went through straight couples, gay couples, old couples, new couples. Criminals and politicians, movie stars and Wes’s parents. (His mother was always relaxed when his dad was around. You almost didn’t notice how hypercritical and neurotic she was.) Couples with tons of squirming, screaming kids, and couples who’d been smart enough not to bring genetic offspring into the world. Couples that were sweet, gentle, and loving. Tough, ambitious, and mean. Irritating. Sappy. Snippy.

Not all of them were happy. So many of them were miserable. The Dumonts had lost the magic years ago. The Captain’s wife was cheating on him, no matter what he said. People came through the precinct every day who’d lied to their girlfriends, stolen from their wives, killed their husbands. Even if they seemed happy, they could be lying. Could be in court in a year, fighting bitterly over who would get the good china.

“This exercise isn’t teaching me anything,” Wes told Travis Friday night, as they were settling into bed. He’d been glaring at the ceiling for half an hour while Travis shuffled around, putting on pajamas, brushing his teeth.

“The doc works in mysterious ways,” Travis said, flopping down on top of the covers.

“Too mysterious,” Wes said. “What’s the point to all of this? I’m not learning anything.”

Travis dropped his chin in his hand and gazed up at Wes, a puzzled look on his face.

“You want to learn something?” he asked. “I thought I was the one with the problem.”

Hearing Travis say it like that, sounding almost hurt, made something twist uncomfortably in Wes’s stomach.

“I don’t know,” Wes said. “Maybe your commitment issues gave me commitment issues. Maybe I already had them. It’s a chicken and egg situation.”

There was a long silence, and then Travis let out a loose, bubbly laugh. He slung an arm around Wes’s waist.

“This is such a breakthrough, baby,” he said, nuzzling his face into Wes’s shoulder. “Dr. Ryan’s gonna cry tears of pride. We’re gonna win couples’ counseling.”

“I said maybe.”

“That is so fine,” Travis said. He was mumbling into the pillow now, voice already getting slow and sleepy. “Maybe is a good start.”

In a few minutes, he was out, and Wes was left there, staring into the dark. His arm was going numb where Travis was laying on it. In the morning, he’d probably wake up to Travis drool all over his pillow.

God, being in a relationship was a nightmare. Bed-sharing and drool and arguing about the dishes. Meeting each other’s parents and fixing each other’s problems. And then it ended, and all you had were bad memories and half your cutlery.

He and Alex had been a great couple. Picture-perfect. They each did the dishes three days a week, taking Sunday off. Alex never hogged the blankets and Wes never snored. When they fought, they always sat down and talked it out, using the “When you x, I feel y” statements that Dr. Ryan was obsessed with. They paid their bills on time, and saved money for retirement, and never made big purchases without talking to each other first.

They shouldn’t have gotten divorced. They’d done everything right.

He and Travis would break up within a year.

What would keep them from breaking up? What would make them last, when most couples didn’t? What was the point of trying, over and over again?

All he could think about was Alex. About the last time they’d had dinner together, before the divorce. Before he’d quit the law firm, before Anthony Padua. He’d made pasta, and she’d been wearing this shimmery blue blouse that made her eyes glow. She sat on the counter while he cooked, and every so often he’d make her taste the sauce.

The conversation kept dying out. Starting and stopping. It had been so hard to keep talking, like his thoughts were stuck in traffic. At the time, he’d thought it was normal. They’d been together for a long time, and they’d heard all of each other’s stories. After the divorce, he’d been angry at himself, convinced that he should have made an effort. He could have fixed things if only he’d tried.

Now, all he could think about was that Alex kept yawning, and rubbing at her eyes. Her sentences would trail off. And Wes couldn’t concentrate on the stories she was telling about her yoga class, her morning commute.

The only time they’d both been interested was when they talked about work. She gave him advice, and he made jokes about their coworkers, and she laughed, actually laughed, eyes getting bright again.

When he made dinner now, Travis would wander in and out. Sometimes they wouldn’t talk all evening, wouldn’t talk for days. And neither of them would notice. They could say everything they wanted with a raised eyebrow, rolling eyes. Travis touching Wes’s hip as he walked past, or Wes rubbing Travis’s back.

They could talk about anything. Sometimes they got bored of each other, annoyed with each other. Pissed off and snapping at each other. But Wes couldn’t see anything, couldn’t do anything, without wanting to tell Travis about it. All their conversations started somewhere in the middle.

With Alex, towards the end, they’d started talking like they were old friends, reunited after years. Nothing but stilted small talk and eternal catching up. Both of them tactful and polite.

So what did it mean? Had he and Alex been doomed from the start? Had there been signs all along, and he’d been too stupid to notice?

Wes sat up, dislodging Travis from his place on his shoulder. Travis mumbled something and tugged the pillow closer, still asleep.

Some part of Wes wanted to call Dr. Ryan. She had to know the answer to this, the big secret. What made marriages last, and what killed them?

He wandered into the kitchen and filled a glass with water. Then he abandoned the glass and starting pacing, the tile cold against his bare feet. the kitchen was dim, lit only by the neon clock on the microwave and faint street lights outside. He kept pacing, running the problem around in his mind like it was a case to be solved.

What could happen, if he married Travis? They could break up. Travis could leave him. Or cheat on him. Or kill him. Maybe they’d have kids and the kids would be traumatized. They’d spend all their time shuffling from one parent to another, never trusting love again. Maybe the kids would love Travis and hate Wes. Maybe one of the _kids_ would kill him.

What did Wes want? With Alex, he’d wanted everything. House, kids, retirement, grandkids. And now, with Travis, he wanted anything he could get. His expectations were so much lower. And a lot higher.

He grabbed his glass and drank the whole thing, barely feeling the water going down his throat.

Captain Sutton wanted Helen, and he got lower blood pressure, a new outlook on life. Dakota wanted Peter, and she got a quiet baby with big eyes and curly hair. Wes wanted Alex, and he got Travis.

He walked back to bedroom, opened the door. Most of the pillows were on the floor now, and Travis was lying across the bed sideways, taking up all the room and half the blankets. He looked ridiculous, his mouth wide open and his face smushed against the mattress.

_Alright_ , Wes thought, sitting down somewhere around Travis’s feet. _Anything I can get._

* * *

The next morning, he woke up to Travis caterwauling in the shower. It was difficult to tell what he was singing. It sounded like a mash-up of “Call Me Maybe” and “My Heart Will Go On.”

For a long time, Wes lay there, hoping that Travis wouldn’t do permanent damage to his ear drums. When Travis stepped out of the bathroom, half-dressed with a towel over his head, Wes was still there.

“Morning, sunshine,” Travis said, dropping a kiss on Wes’s cheek and dripping on his pajamas. “Excited for therapy?”

“Ecstatic,” Wes said.

“Me too.” Travis moved to the closet and started searching for a shirt. Wes sat up. “You know I won the competition. Unless you can think of 20 nice things before the session.”

“I doubt it.”

“This might be the easiest game we’ve ever played,” Travis said. He took out a gray v-neck and tugged it on. “I hope Dr. Ryan gives us more assignments.”

“Uh-huh,” Wes said, staring down at his hands. “Trav?”

“Yeah?”

“If you’re going to propose to me, you’ll need to get a ring,” Wes said, and Travis froze in the middle of reaching down to get his boots. He turned toward Wes slowly, eyes wide. “And make an event of it please? I don’t want to tell our grandkids you proposed in bed.”

“You want me to propose?” Travis asked, voice cracking slightly.

“Only if you do it right,” Wes said. “I want a ring. And dinner. And no public displays.”

He had more specifications, but they didn’t matter because Travis was grinning, bright and beautiful, and then he was sinking onto the bed, grabbing the front of Wes’s shirt and pulling him close.

“It’s gonna be a huge display, baby,” he said. “I’m gonna get a skywriter.”

“If you get a skywriter, I’ll say no.”

“That’s okay,” Travis said, his arms wrapping around Wes’s neck and his hands going into Wes’s hair. “I’ll just ask you again. And again. And again.”

“I get the picture,” Wes said, smiling into Travis’s shoulder.


End file.
